“It could be a downhill ride, Vicki. And one way.”
“That would be retribution.”
“You’re one hell of a girl, Vicki.”
“One way or another,” she murmured.
We carried the dishes to the kitchen and did the domestic bit according to the magazine ads: she washed and I dried.
When the kitchen was cleaned up and the dish towel hung neatly on the rack we returned to the living room and Vicki put on some records that specialized in soft music. It wasn’t logical for the feet in my shoes to feel as content and comfortable as they did just then.
“There are things I ought to be doing out there,” I said and pointed to the dark city beyond the window.
She walked over and stood beside me. “Not now, Steve,” she said. “Not tonight.”
“I’m short of time.”
She returned to the sofa and sat down. “Sometimes a night can be a lifetime, Steve.” She leaned back and her dark hair fell loose over her shoulders. “But if you’ve gotta leave—that’s the way it’s going to be.”
I fished the half-pack of cigarettes from my pocket, handed one over to her and took one for myself. I lit us up and tried to keep my eyes from meeting hers when she leaned forward to the flame. I knew damned well how much she was offering me. For a guy on the run it was Heaven—with no conditions.
We talked, because without saying so, I decided to stay and Vicki told me about her farm childhood, about the bad years when the crops failed and food was scarce, when the welfare people helped out and then told the whole town about it. It was then she decided that she wanted money more than anything else in the world and she didn’t care too much how she got it. It explained a lot.
As she continued with her autobiography, the dim light from the lamp caressed her face and suddenly she looked very sad to me although there was no self-pity in her voice, or even regret as she recited the facts of her life as though she were a chemist reciting a completed reaction. You took a kid with good looks, added hunger for money and fear of being without it, and you got a fancy apartment at the Vanguard. It just worked out that way.
We lapsed into silence, the better to look back over the years; each of us taking inventory and wondering what might have happened if things had been just a little different.
“I’d be a ripe subject for one of those true confession magazines,” Vicki murmured and curled her legs up under her.
“Do you figure a happy ending?” I asked.
“Who knows? I never count on anything.”
I straightened, stretched and glanced at my watch. It was nearly midnight. “Gotta call my new friend, Liz,” I said.
She nodded toward the phone and stood up. “Help yourself. Well”—she hesitated a moment—“I’ll fix you a bed out here. Maybe you’ll be able to catch a little sleep.” Her eyes were on me, but I didn’t object.
“If I’m not going out,” I said.
She went into her bedroom as I called the Malibu number. The old girl with the grey hair answered to tell me pleasantly that Miss Wakely had gone out and wasn’t home yet, but she had left a message for me to call in the morning. When I hung up Vicki was back with an armful of bedding and a new toothbrush.
She gave it to me. “I always keep spares,” she said.
“Thanks,” I told her and reported the news of the call.
“It’s just as well,” she nodded. “You’ll need some rest.”
I left her, crossed through the bedroom and into the bath, a real production with mirrored walls. Good for people who have to see themselves from every angle.
When I returned to the living room Vicki had made my bunk by placing all the sofa pillows on the floor. A pair of blue silk pajamas lay over the arm of a nearby chair.
“They’re probably too small.” She frowned.
There was an awkward pause. She smiled and moved abruptly away toward the bedroom. A crazy thing was happening to us: we were both acting like kids.
“I’ll leave you to your boudoir,” she said. “Goodnight, Steve.”
“Goodnight, Vicki,” I answered as she went into her bedroom and closed the door.
Again I stood for a moment to study the view, wondering what kind of shuffle it was readying for me at daybreak. Then I crossed to the lamp and turned it down until it gave out a faint blue glow to make the room dark with shadows.
I stripped down to the skin and was just reaching for the pajamas when the bedroom door opened and a shaft of light stretched through the darkness and caught me at the chin. I started to step back into the shadows, then didn’t.
Vicki’s negligee might have been made of cobwebs. The light behind her picked up the lines of her lovely body and made them glow in sensual outline.
“I—” she stopped, and when she spoke again it was with a flatness that left the words without meaning. “I wondered if you wanted the alarm.”
I made another false move toward the shadows.
“It doesn’t matter,” I said foolishly.
She came toward me and every step was in obedience to an instinct that was older and more insistent than either of us.
“We can’t help being what we are—you or I—can we?” she whispered.
I took a step toward her because it was the way things had to be and didn’t care about the light from the bedroom. All the light in the world—even the noonday sun—wouldn’t have made any difference because the next moment she was in my arms.
Chapter Eight
My head slipping off the pillow, the morning sunlight pouring in through the broad expanse of glass, and the sweet smell of percolating coffee woke me, but it was a moment before I remembered where I was. Then I yelled and Vicki, dressed in a peasant skirt and blouse that made her look ten years younger, appeared in the doorway.
“Yes, master?” she said and dropped a curtsy.
“What’s the opposite of master?” I wrapped a blanket around me.
“I’ve a hot skillet handy,” she warned.
“Is that coffee I smell?”
“Want some?”
“Like a child wants his mother.”
“Coming up.”
Vicki winked and by the time I had yawned myself awake she was back and cool lips brushed across my forehead as she gave me the coffee.
“Of course there’s nothing to it,” she said as I grinned at her over the edge of my cup, “but I feel like a bride this morning.”
“It’s the spring air,” I said.
“There’ll be breakfast right away,” she said. “So you have fifteen minutes.”
Clutching my blanket to me I hobbled across to her bedroom, tossed the blanket across the bed, went into the bathroom and stepped into the glass shower cage. As I toweled off I glanced into the mirror and gave myself a wink.
When I’d finished shaving I found my clothes in Vicki’s room. I dressed rapidly, cinched the knot into my tie, and reported to the kitchen to find breakfast served.
“What is it about me,” I asked, “that makes me so lucky with women?”
“You tell me,” she said.
I started to eat. “I’ve got to call Liz Wakely. If she has the dope on the boy in the coupe I’ve a heavy date this morning.”
Vicki’s short glance wiped all the fun from her face. “Do you have to go on with it?” she asked.
“I can’t hide out here forever.”
“I know,” she said, “it was a stupid question. It’s going to be awful—waiting for you—listening to the radio—”
She forced a smile and looked away. “I didn’t know I had all that sentimentality in me.”
“We surprise ourselves sometimes,” I said.
When I called Miss Wakely the housekeeper answered and told me to wait while she ascertained whether Miss W. was as yet available for the rigors of telephonic communication—or words to that effect. I wondered who’d kept her up so late. Presently another receiver lifted somewhere in the house.
“Hello,” Liz’s cool, modulated voic
e said. “You caught me lying down.”
“You shouldn’t stay out so late.”
“I’m not in bed,” she drawled. “My masseuse is here and beating the daylights out of me.”
“I’d have sworn you didn’t need it,” I said.
“I love you for that,” she laughed. “By the way the papers inform me you’re one of the most sought-after men in town.”
“It’s great to be popular,” I said. “Maybe it’s because I read the right ads.”
“Don’t read the ones for Forest Lawn,” she said, “not right now.” There was a pause and when she spoke again her voice was more businesslike. “I had to make chatter until the woman left the room. She’s gone now.”
“I thought you were being awfully cute for so early in the day,” I said, glad the small talk was out of the way.
“Your boy,” she said with emphasis, “—if it’s the right one—his name’s Bernie Haggart.”
“Bernie Haggart,” I repeated. “Means nothing to me.”
“He has a record that goes way back, but he’s been clean for some time now,” Liz informed me. “Which only means he hasn’t been caught recently.”
“Where do I find him?”
“He’s at a hideout somewhere. It’ll take time to find out where. Maybe it’s known only to Haggart and God—and maybe Talmadge. A rhetorical question”—she paused—“but you know the Glass Garter?”
“Intimately,” my voice became heavy.
“Right now it’s the contact point for Talmadge’s hoods.”
“I’ve made a few contacts there myself.”
“Sooner or later Haggart ought to show there. Or,” she said, pausing again, “I could have the police pick him up for some sweating.”
“The police can pick him up when I get through with him,” I said. “After we’ve had our meeting.”
“It’s your game, of course.”
I wondered whether to tell her about the chase in the Hollywood Hills, but decided not to tie up the phones. “I’ll check with you later,” I said.
“Remember,” she replied, “if you need a safe home base you can count on immunity from Talmadge here with me.”
“Many thanks.” I meant it. “I’ll keep it in mind.”
“Good luck,” she said and rang off.
I hung up and saw Vicki standing behind me.
“Why so many thanks?” she asked.
“You aren’t developing into a jealous woman, are you?” I asked.
“I’ve developed.” She was fast on the uptake. “I’m already shopping for bargains in pearl-handled revolvers. You’ve made your date?”
I nodded. “If he shows.”
She put her hand to my sleeve. “Big or little risk, Steve?”
“Who knows?”
“You do. Big or little?”
“Medium,” I said and winked. “I’ll keep it down to a minimum or none at all if I can help it.” We looked at each other for a moment before I took her in my arms. She pressed her lips to mine and the back of my neck got hot. She was one girl who could keep your fever up till you forgot everything else.
“See you later.” Reluctantly, I let her go.
* * * *
It was a little past one o’clock and the traffic was steady when I parked downstreet from the Garter, adjusted the rearview mirror, and slid low in the seat. A blowsy dame went into the joint and didn’t come out again. The usual types moved along the street.
A cop on a motor cruised the block, checking for parking violations. It was an hour zone and I shielded my face by pretending to search through the glove compartment. When he had passed I sat up again.
An hour went by and proved it to be a dead day at the Glass Garter. Only a few hangers-on drifted in and out and when I saw the cop crawling the block again I pulled out, circled the block to the left, and pulled into a parking lot.
I paid the parking kid and walked up the street to an outdoor shoeshine stand and climbed one of the seats. I picked up a newspaper from the seat next to me and kept it in front of my face as an old colored man ambled out of an enclosure in the back and went to work on my shoes. Apparently he didn’t crave conversation either.
When the shine was finished I flipped the old man a half and sat there pretending to be absorbed in the news. He took it, mumbled thanks, and disappeared into the back room again. I was reading the cartoons for the second time when from the corner of my eye I caught sight of a figure passing on the sidewalk. It was the guy who had been tailing me in the coupe. As I got off the chair he turned and our eyes met for a moment, but it was long enough for me to see the flicker of alarm in his pitted, unhealthy face. His step faltered, then he moved on quickly.
Whatever else the guy was he wasn’t slow on his feet. By the time I hit the sidewalk he was almost to the end of the block so I beat the pavement after him as hard as I could. He wasn’t going to get away from me. Not if I could help it, he wasn’t.
He disappeared around the corner blocked off by some Skid Row sport in a loud mismatched plaid jacket. I stiff-armed him out of the way and probably knocked him down. I didn’t look back to see but someone let out an angry yell and cursed me with professional competence.
My boy was halfway down the block. He looked back, spotted me, and darted suddenly between a couple of parked cars into the moving traffic.
There was a screech of brakes, a woman’s scream, but he got through, running on the other sidewalk.
I followed after him and came close to leaving my tail on a chromium bumper, and saw that he had disappeared. Then I saw an alley entrance and headed for it.
He was nearly to the far end and my breath was beginning to burn in my throat. I gained on him a fraction, but he reached the other end and disappeared again. I was hitting for the sidewalk when a delivery truck loomed outside in the street and turned right toward me into the mouth of the alley. I flattened myself against the brick wall, panting, and the truck bumped past to graze my chest.
There was no sign of him when I got to the street. I checked both sides of the block and the alley across, and turned back. Then I caught sight of him getting into his tan coupe which was parked just a few yards ahead.
In a split second I made it to the right hand door of the car, grabbed the door handle, and pulled it open. The little guy had left it off the latch when he got in, which was tough for him.
I grabbed up a handful of his necktie, a sickly powder blue thing with a naked girl painted on it, and his head snapped around. He looked directly at me, his eyes wide and almost entirely colorless, and his lips pulled back to make a sucking sound to show his teeth in a twisted, grinning grimace.
“Why don’t you reach for your shiv, you dirty little sonofabitch?” I said. “Or is that only for the ladies?”
I twisted the necktie tighter and the air wheezed in his throat as his hand grappled for the key in the ignition, but I slapped it away and let up on the tie a little.
“Wha—what do you want?” he gasped.
“That’s a laugh,” I said. “I want your time.” Now that I had him, madness flooded my brain; thinking of Ann Gunther I wanted to kill him with my bare hands. “I want the word on the Vegas jobs.”
“I—I don’t even know what you’re talking about,” he whined. “I—”
There was the slow, rising cry of a police siren down the block and I relaxed my hold on him, which was all he needed. He lurched forward and in one swift sequence twisted the key in the ignition, started the car, and stepped on the gas. The car leaped forward and the door whipped forward to crash against my back. After that everything was a blur as the door frame slammed into the side of my face, my head was filled with the sound of screeching tires and the racing engine, and I was vaguely aware of falling and striking the pavement.
I must have blacked out for just a beat. Then I was on my knees and someone held me under the arms. The police car was screeching nearer and nearer as I looked into faces that were strange to me. The sound of the siren put me
into action again. Everything was hazy but out of the fog I picked out the entrance to the alley and I made for it, shoving through the crowd, weaving like a guy on a three-day drunk. Someone yelled behind me, but I kept on going.
A wave of nausea hit me as I entered the alley and I put my hand against the brick wall. Then I shoved off and started running. There was babbling behind me and the siren whined to a stop.
I managed to keep running until I reached the opposite end of the alley, turned onto the sidewalk, and moved on at a walk. No one looked around. At the end of the block I crossed the street to the left and dusted myself down as I moved. My cheek ached where the door had hit it but I was getting my breath back.
I looked a mess and the boy in the parking lot gave me a funny look as I handed him the ticket and climbed into the car. Dizziness hit me again and I dropped my head against the wheel until it passed.
“You all right, mister?” the boy asked.
“Sure.” I straightened up. “I slipped—that’s all.”
My head cleared. I shoved the car into gear, backed out, and hoped the kid wouldn’t identify me and the car. But he didn’t look like the bright type or the cop-loving type.
I wedged the car into traffic and took it as I waited for the last blurred edges to clear. A lump was rising on my cheek. I cursed softly to myself, partly from pain, but mostly because I’d let my quarry get away again. Fate had offered me two chances to get myself out of this mess and I had fumbled both of them. Maybe I wouldn’t get another.
Chapter Nine
Twice on the way to Beverly Hills I turned off the street to avoid oncoming police cars. I cut into the street leading to the Vanguard and eased over for the turn into the garage but didn’t make it because the car parked out front had an official license. At the end of the block I turned right and kept going. Things were getting tighter. From a back booth in a neighborhood drugstore, I dialed Vicki’s number.
Her voice told me she had company because the way she said hello was a warning.
“Miss Mercer?” I pushed my voice up a tone.
“Oh,” Vicki said uncertainly, “oh yes. You’ll have to call me again about cleaning the drapes. No—I’m sorry I can’t talk to you now.” I heard a click on the line that meant someone was picking up the receiver in the bedroom. “We’ll have to do it when I’m out of town,” she went on. “Thank you and goodbye.” She hung up.
The Noir Novel Page 60